At the Tokyo district court today, a lawyer for Mt. Gox announced the move and said the company has an outstanding debt of about 6.5 billion yen ($63.6 million).

Mt. Gox disappeared from the Internet earlier this week amid rumors that it is battling insolvency. Subsequently, CEO Mark Karpeles told customers on the Mt. Gox homepage that he was “working very hard with the support of different parties to find a solution” to the exchange’s various issues.

Filing for bankruptcy protection will no doubt add on to those concerns — and cast a shadow on the future of Bitcoin. Pre-empting such a response, the heads of six of the world’s biggest Bitcoin exchanges earlier penned a letter in response to reports of Mt. Gox’s impending insolvency.